Thursday May 20th

3pm

84 Stanton Street

After sending a few places from my “must try list” to The Wandering Foodie we decided on the recently open Meatball Shop in the Lower East Side for a late lunch. I read about it when it first opened, and the idea of being able to order meatballs at 4am was intriguing (the kitchen is open until 4am Thursday – Saturday, until 2am Sunday – Wednesday). If you didn’t guess from the name, meatballs are the specialty of the house. The space itself is small—a large communal table fills most of the dining room with a few tables running along the side wall and about a dozen seats at the bar. During warm weather there’s a few tables available outside as well. Fresh flowers are neatly arranged at each table, a chalkboard announces the specials of the day (featuring a daily meatball, sauce, side, salad and ice-cream) and black and white vintage family portraits line the red wall.

When you sit down you’re handed a laminated menu and a dry erase marker to make your selections. The menu is divided into 3 sections: Ala Carte Balls, Sandwiches – hero (served on a baugette) or sliders, and a meatball smash (served on a brioche bun).

How it works:

Step 1. Select ala carte, slider, hero or smash

Step 2. Select your meatball – chicken, beef, pork, vegetarian (made with lentils and walnuts) or special

Step 3. Choose a sauce – classic tomato, spicy beef, parmasean cream, mushroom or special

Step 4. Mozzarella or provolone

I love the idea of taking one food – the meatball – and creating an endless choice of options, but I guess this is why you get the dry erase marker in case you start to second guess. If you’re at a loss the wait staff will gladly offer up their recommendations and favorite combinations. These aren’t Mom’s meatballs (my Sicilian Mother and Grandmother used a mix of pork, veal and beef and simmered them in a tomato sauce with neck bones for flavor), but they were tender and delicious. I recommend trying the basil pesto (if available as the special) with a chicken meatball or the spicy beef with a beef meatball (beef on beef seems so gluttonous but tasted so good).

Tip: Don’t forget to save room for dessert! The ice-cream is made in-house and you can create a “custom” ice-cream sandwich from a choice of four types of cookies or a brownie.

Lunch

(I had a taste of each)

• Sliders – beef with spicy beef, special jambalaya with shrimp, andouille and rice with basil pesto (the only miss, was too salty and fishy), pork with mushroom, chicken with classic tomato
• Smash – chicken with basil pesto and mozzarella (my favorite)
• Side of white beans
• Special salad – arugula with asparagus and a creamy lemon vinagarette
• Market salad – arugula with apples
• House made tangerine, caramel and mint ice-cream with a ginger snap cookie on the side (We couldn’t come to a decision on a sandwich combination so ordered ala carte)

Good for: Meatballs, Endless Choices of Meatballs, Late Night Meatballs, Customizable Ice-Cream Sandwiches

Sunday May 9th

3pm

656 Avenue of the Americas (6th Avenue)

Only in NYC can a church be transformed into a night club and then years later reinvented again into an indoor marketplace. The Limelight Marketplace recently opened this past Friday and I couldn’t wait to check it out. The 3-level 25,000-square-foot space features a variety of shops, ranging from retail (Havianas), to chocolate (Mariebelle), to tea (Miss Tea), to a variety of gourmet and specialty food purveyors and a green market in the courtyard. As if all of this wasn’t enough Grimaldi’s pizza will soon open an outpost here, which in addition to a dining room, is slated to be open 24/7 serving slices to-go from a takeout window on 6th Avenue. Brilliant!

Note: Hours are Monday – Saturday 10am – 10pm and Sunday 11am – 8pm.

The Sweet Room:

• The Cupcake Stop
• The Little Candy Cake Co.
• Maribelle Express
• Mari’s New York
• Wannahaveacookie

Gourmet Food:

• Jezalin’s
• Grimaldi’s (opening soon)
• Gastropub (opening soon)
• Peak Season Green Market (located in the courtyard)

Specialty Food:

• Baci Gelato
• Butterfly Bakeshop
• Carter & Cavero
• Miss Tea

Good for: Gourmet and Specialty food, The anticipation of 24/7 Grimaldi’s slices in Manhattan, green market

Saturday April 17th, 2010
11:15pm
1 Little West 12th Street

A month in New York isn’t complete without at least one birthday party and/or going away party invitation – tonight it was the latter and a prime table at one of the newest Meatpacking ventures The Collective. It’s is part of The One Group, who also own STK and Tenjune, but it’s definitely got it’s own unique identity. Upon entering you really don’t know where to look first – there’s machinery on the walls, sculptures made of pill bottles, pillars adorned with jewelry, street signs, chairs made of functional crosswalk signs (see photo below). It’s unlike any space I’ve seen and kind of felt like being in the intersection where Dada meets Dali meets Dr. Suess (I’m a fan of all). Staying true to the name, The Collective is a mix of people, ages, styles, music, food and drinks. The bar area isn’t that big, and the main draw seemed to be tables that can accomodate large groups – a few of them celebrating birthdays and bachelorette parties. There’s  a small dinner menu, but it’s not really a restaurant as more of a lounge that serves food. The menu features a section called “a taste of the hoods,” which is supposed to feature favorites by neighborhood but the choices seem a little clichéd. A few people in our group ordered food and it looked average for upwards of $20 an entree. I’d recommend sticking to the cocktails while taking in the eye candy.

Cocktail

• Moscow Mule – vodka, ginger beer and lime

GOOD FOR: SINGLES, GROUPS, CELEBRATING, TABLE SERVICE, COCKTAILS, LATE NIGHT, EYE CANDY

Friday April 16th, 2010
12:45pm
15 west 56th street (Chambers Hotel)

After attending a morning session of the Behance 99% Conference at the Felissimo Design House I realized I was across the street from the Chambers Hotel, home to the newly opened Midtown outpost of Momofuku Milk Bar and David Chang’s newest venture Má Pêche. Since last Fall Má Pêche has been operating out of the mezzanine at the Chambers Hotel, only offering the Midtown Lunch – a $10 box lunch to-go featuring a choice of Banh Mi with a water or soda (add a Momofuku Milk Bar peanut butter cookie for an extra $1.85). The dining room on the main level recently opened for lunch at the beginning of April, but since I was dining solo I opted for the more laid back option of the 2nd floor mezzanine. It was set up like any other trendy hotel lobby upstairs – oversized couches, a few chairs and tables, shelves lined with books on Warhol and New York City photography- however you can sit wherever you like and order from a streamlined menu. Most of the items are around $16 (with the exception of the skirt steak at $29) and there’s no sides or accompaniments. In the true style of David Chang my pork spareribs were so tender and flavorful in a lemongrass carmel reduction that a few field greens on the side wouldn’t of added anything more to the meal.

NOTE: The Banh mi ($10) is only offered on the bar menu available on the mezzanine level and not the dining room, so if this is what you’re craving head upstairs.

Lunch

• Côtelletes de porc (Newman’s Farm, MO) – pork ribs, coated in peanuts and served in a lemongrass caramel reduction

Good for: Business Lunch, dining Solo, Pork, Milk Bar Treats, $10 Midtown Lunch (to-go), Did I mention Pork?

Thursday April 8th, 2010
6:45pm
637 Hudson Street

I love ‘inoteca, cucina on Rivington Street, so when brothers Jason and Joe Denton opened Corsino in the West Village I couldn’t wait to try it. The interior evokes a bit of ‘inoteca—hard wood floors, wooden walls, bottles of wine lining the shelves, casual yet elegant. Unfortunately that’s where the similarities ended. The service was spotty and over the course of our hour and a half there we had at least 3 different servers. The wine list by the glass is small (Italian Reds, Whites and a few Sparkling) and I found the food to be over-priced (each piece of crostini costs $2.50). The mushroom & tallegio and cannellini bean & artichoke were the standouts, however the olive tapenade (over salted) and shrimp and arugula (fishy and creamy with one lone piece of arugula on top) were inedible. Our server let us pick out another to try to make up for it, and the substitute ricotta and orange honey proved to be a good choice. My bill was nearly $40 (including tip) for a glass of wine, a few shared crostini and a cheese plate. I really wanted to like Corsino, but I think the concept is far better than the execution.

Wine

• 2007 Brigaldara Valpolicella - a balanced medium-bodied Italian red with notes of berry

Appetizers (shared by the table)

• olives
• mushroom and tallegio
• cannellini bean and artichoke (had a nice hint of cinnamon)
• ricotta and orange honey
• olive tapenade (inedible – flavor overpowered with salt)
• shrimp and arugula (inedible – a creamy, fishy blend topped with one sad piece of arugula)
• cheese plate – fresh cow’s milk ricotta, taleggio and capra sardo

GOOD For: A GLASS OF WINE AT THE BAR, PRE OR POST DATE DRINK

Tuesday March 23, 2010
12:45pm
66 Pearl Street

I ventured out for a salad and noticed that FIKA had opened on Pearl Street. Curious, I stepped inside to the minimalist interior to place my order. The menu features classic Swedish dishes (shrimp salad, gravlax, meatballs), along with salads and sandwiches. They also carry truffles and pastries along with a coffee bar, as the name implies. The prices are a bit high for lunch, my salad ended up costing $14 because I added chicken to it – which ended up looking better than it tasted. Next time I’ll be ordering coffee … and a truffle.

Lunch

• Pear & Walnut Salad – blue cheese, roasted walnuts (skipped and added chicken), pear, cherry tomatoes, radish

GOOD FOR: COFFEE, TRUFFLES, INFORMAL MEETING